Here are more of the garage sale treasures I found yesterday. The tube pan has a removable bottom and will replace my very old one that did not have that feature. The large serving spoon and the ladle will be useful. Not so sure about the "make-up" mirror b/c it is so small. But as you can see, it was only .25. The oldie-timie wooden box just appealed to me. I don't know yet what I'll use it for.
These wooden dowel stands are something I've been looking for for some time. I have all my dinner plates in a similar but different kind of dowel system which I must show you some time, but I wanted my 8" plates openly displayed as well. ( The plates were already mine. I just put them in so you get the general idea). These cost me .25 for both!!
You may wonder why I would buy a set of chess pieces when I don't play chess but I have a reason. I have a hand-painted tic-tac-toe board that I have no proper pieces for and my grandson would make us play with plastic buttons with either Cinderella or Belle on them. Now we can use black or white chess pieces. The game still seems pointless but kids do enjoy playing!
The salt shaker has a metal top with 7 holes. My DH has already drilled those holes bigger and at this moment, in my kitchen window, I have it holding some Hellebore flowers upright. The holes are just perfect for the job.
I very much like these kind of drawer handles and have in the past paid between 6 and 7 dollars EACH. These six cost me a dollar for all six. Can't beat that and you can be sure I will find a use for them. I'm thinking we will replace the handles on the drawers in our camper van. DH is planning on making some changes in there and this could be part of an up-date.
That's it for my Saturday treasures. I hope you've enjoyed seeing them. GRANNY MARIGOLD
There were exactly three garage sales in this morning's paper but what great ones they were!! The prices were low and there was a variety of items to choose from. I replenished my supply of candles.
Most were a dime each except for the tea lights which were a dollar for the pack.
The white ceramic "purse" will be given a few coats of white paint to make it waterproof then I'll use it for small bouquets of flowers. The shoelaces, Easter fridge magnet, purple necklace, pretty book plates, and the craft containers will all come in handy.
This box of assorted glass gems and starfish was too pretty to leave behind.
Big blue flowerpot. Can't have too many plant pots.
Books were all .25 . Nancy, you will notice that I found a copy of Dick Pronecke's book " One Man's Wilderness".
I found many more items but I think this post is long enough. The rest of the stuff will be a future post.
Hope you're having a great week end. Granny Marigold
Yesterday we had lovely weather and I puttered outside. Today it has been raining so off to the thrift store I went but had no luck there. Back home I decided to read some blogs. Someone mentioned Carrot Cake Scones. Hmmm. That sounded interesting so I looked up some recipes ( there were lots!!) and found most of them were just regular scone recipes with grated carrot added as well as raisins and cinnamon. Oh yes, brown sugar instead of white was often used. The dough was quite sticky but the results are very tasty indeed. The only thing I'd do different would be to add more sugar next time. I used half a cup for a recipe using 3 cups of flour. I'd add a full cup next time.
My mini daffodils have shot up and all the buds are now open. I find them so cheery!!
The bunch of cut Daffodils are also fully open now and won't last long but are so sweet and cheerful.
My Morning Glory seeds have sprouted and are looking good. The three little pots on the left have Columbine seeds that I got from a neighbour but somehow I don't think they'll germinate.
You have to look real hard to see that a few Sweet Pea seeds have started peeking out. I hope they'll grow well this year. Last year I had very sad looking Sweet Peas and there weren't even enough to make a bouquet to bring inside.
So that's what I'm up to today. How about you? Granny M.
I know it's really too early to be buying my plants but I couldn't resist going to look at all the beauty of them!!
These are the ones that came home with me. The three pots of lilies were only a dollar each. Those will be put out into a single pot when it warms up. Hopefully they'll bloom for many years to come.
The pansies could go out already but I think I'll wait until April just to make sure we don't get a late frost. The Begonia will stay inside until probably end of May and the same for the pink Gerbera Daisy ( in front of the lilies). There's also a pot of mini Daffodils beside them, destined for outside once they're done blooming. Do you see the little pot of Basil beside the Pansies? There's also a pot of Chocolate Mint hiding in there. All this pleasure for less than $20. Not bad, I'd say.
GRANNY MARIGOLD
I'm still fighting this cold and laryngitis so I am not terribly motivated to do much. The weather, which has been fairly pleasant for a few days, has now gone back to rain. Also not very inspiring. So...here are some random thoughts today.
I don't often ( well, not VERY often) buy something totally on impulse but at the Dollar Store they had these metal pans to shape tortillas into "edible bowls" for three dollars. I thought that I'd like to try them out and they worked fine. Only I couldn't figure out how to eat my edible bowl once I had finished my salad. My DH thought ice cream would make a much better "filling" but even then.... how to eat the darn thing. Pick it up and nibble? Or break it into pieces?
I bought myself another pot of the mini Daffodils last week. They are so pretty and by putting them outside at night I can prolong their blooming time. The tin just beside them is one I got a few years ago. The pattern on it is raised and has the look almost of stained glass. It originated in the U.K. and perhaps came filled with cookies? I, of course, bought it at the thrift shop and it was empty.
I just finished rereading Lark Rise to Candleford by Flora Thompson. I have two copies of this book. One is a paperback copy and the other a hard covered, rich red copy, which has great illustrations but has large portions left out. Now I'm reading another of Thompson's books, Still Glides the Stream, but am not finding this one as interesting as the first one. Maybe because Lark Rise is autobiographical and the second book is strictly fiction. Still Glides the Stream is also hard copy and with matching red cover. Red being one of my favourite colours these two books are in a prominent spot on my bookshelves.
Time for more hot tea to ease my throat. Granny Marigold
Those who know me, and those who follow my blog. know how much I love pretty tea cups. Rarely do I buy new ones, most come from garage sales or are given to me as gifts. The six pictured below came from an awesome garage sale I went to just this morning. The proceeds were going to support an orphanage in Africa so I went prepared to buy whatever caught my eye. And I did.
These tea cups were going for a quarter each but I told the person taking the money that they were worth more so we settled on a dollar each ( as well as a dollar for the gorgeous plate in the last picture.)
Beginning on the left, the pretty green one ( which looks washed out but really isn't) is Royal Albert "Laurentian Snowdrops",the one slightly back is another Royal Albert this time the pattern is
" Dainty Blue"
The dark coral is Paragon, the pink one behind is also Paragon. The white one with bouquets of violets is Royal Grafton and the Turquoise one with roses is Foley Bone China and is my absolute favourite of these six.
There was so much that I didn't even get to really look at because of the crowds of people that
attended. My sweet miss C had come too and she found some cute slippers and other clothing, again, priced to sell! We both could have spent another hour looking but Husband , who had kindly been our chauffeur, was bored. Anyway, we were happy with our finds!!
Happy Saturday! Granny Marigold
It's a chilly day, the kind of day that makes you want to bake some cookies. I was watching a cooking show this week and they were making Biscotti. I have often made them in the past so I decided to make some again. I used my tried and true recipe as opposed to theirs because theirs didn't use any butter and mine does. Has to make them tastier, don't you agree?
The recipe is so simple. Here it is:
1/4 cup butter or marg.
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
vanilla
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
Mix together and form two slightly flattened logs. Bake until light golden colour. Remove from the oven and let them cool about 10 minutes, no longer. If they cool too much they are harder to cut into slices, which is the next step. Its nice to cut them on the diagonal but not necessary. Replace on the cookie sheet ( lying flat) and bake another 7 to 10 minutes or until golden. Oh yes, oven temp. is 350
I doubled my recipe and put almond extract and chopped almonds in half. In the other half I used chopped hazelnuts and the rest of my glaced fruit ( left from Christmas).
Granny M.
